


On the Origins of the Vast

by serannes



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Academia, Ancient Greece, Dark Academia, Entities, Gen, Just nerdy TMA lore, Nerdiness, Original Statement (The Magnus Archives), Philosophy, References to Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, Rituals, Spoilers, Statement Fic, The Fairchilds, There's a bibliography, kind of, spoilers for episode 160
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-04-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:13:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23881372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serannes/pseuds/serannes
Summary: 'On the origins of the Vast and the Fairchild Family'Statement of Ananda Fairchild, taken from their unpublished archives, undated.Research into the possible origins of the Entity known as the Vast in Presocratic Greece.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	On the Origins of the Vast

**Author's Note:**

> Possible spoilers for Episode 160 (not involving any of the characters, just the general lore). Be warned.

Case #6497556

Statement of Ananda Fairchild, taken from their unpublished archives, undated.

On the origins of the Vast and the Family

I was still a child when I learned that the Vast was the oldest of all the Entities. As time is limitless, so too is the Vast limitless: the Vast has existed as long as time has. I refrain from using the phrase ‘existed since before the beginning of time’, for, as any of the Family well know, time has no beginning, and nor does the Falling Titan.

I shall not go into the details of my early encounters with the Limitless, save to say that I was marked for life, and developed an obsessive fascination with my Patron that itched and burned away at my everyday existence, and could only be quenched—however fleetingly—with research and a devouring of knowledge. I have often wondered if I would have been, if things had unspooled differently in my early years, a devotee of the Beholding—perhaps that is why Simon has always harboured his suspicions of me. He has never bothered to hide his dislike of me, dismissing my hunger for knowledge to fill the void of our ignorance in the face of our Unending as disloyalty. I believe I have Harriett or Lucille to thank for my life—not that I trust in their compassion, but rather in the cold pragmatism with which they regarded my researches. I know better than to trust myself in their hands forever, and so I have made the decision to hide myself from all until I have had a chance to complete my investigations into those matters which Simon regards with such distaste.

To give a brief outline of my research so far, into the origins of human involvement with the Falling Titan, and my resulting speculations:

As far as I can ascertain, the first avatar of the Vast was Anaximander (c. 610-c. 548 BCE) of Miletus. Records are unable to tell us if he was driven by fear or reverence; the two are not mutually exclusive. My Family’s private archives demonstrate that he lived his last years in increasing senility, and while there are conflicting accounts of his death, the majority of my family’s evidence suggests he suffocated to death in a tiny stone room, locked from the inside. Many, of course, are unable to bear the scrutiny of our Great Master.

Anaximander acted as a conduit for human anxieties about the Vast to become perceptible. Prior to his work, there was not much credence given to the notion that humans would ever be confronted with the infinite unknowable. Their unknown elements were at the time couched in limited, delineated forms; they made their gods into humans, and prostrated themselves on the ground before their laughable travesties of Divinity. And yet somehow, from this mockery of civilisation, came insight.

The crowning achievement of Anaximander’s work was his first principle, _apeiron_ (literally meaning ‘the boundless’ or ‘something without limits’), and it differed from earlier histories of the universe in that it diverged from narratives of theogony and assumed a hitherto unseen impersonality. We lack extensive written records of his theories, and must rely on later commentaries; for example, those of Theophrastus, who writes:

“Anaximander said that _the first principle and element of existing things was the boundless_ ; it was he who originally introduced this name for the first principle. He says that it is not water or any of the other so-called elements, but _something different from them, something boundless by nature, which is the source of all the heavens and the worlds in them_.”

(Theophrastus, _Commentary;_ italics my own.)

“…And he says that the original sources of existing things are also _what existing things die back into ‘according to necessity’_ ; for they give justice and reparation to one another for their injustice in accordance with the ordinance of Time’”

(Theophrastus, _Commentary;_ italics my own.)

Similar sentiments can be found in Aristotle’s _Physics_ ; in his description of Anaximander’s philosophy, he writes:

“Moreover, they take _the infinite not to be subject to generation or destruction_ , on the grounds that it is a kind of principle, because anything generated must have a last part that is generated, and there is also a point at which the destruction of anything ends. That is why, as I say, _the infinite is taken not to have an origin, but to be the origin of everything else_ —to contain everything and steer everything, as has been said by those thinkers who do not recognize any other causes (such as love or intelligence) apart from the infinite. _They also call it the divine, on the grounds that it is immortal and imperishable; on this Anaximander and the majority of the natural scientists are in agreement_.”

(Aristotle, _Physics;_ italics my own.)

From this section, we can confirm not only the central tenets of Anaximander’s first principle, but also the existence of a _likeminded set of thinkers and followers of the Vast_. These thinkers apparently “do not recognize any other causes (such as love or intelligence) apart from the infinite. They also call it the divine, on the grounds that it is immortal and imperishable”. Thus we can see some origins for our own genealogy; and though Simon’s reprehensible disregard for record-keeping has made it impossible for me to ascertain, I must wonder if the name of Fairchild—or its Ancient Greek equivalent—originated with this cabal?

Indeed, it is far from impossible that Anaximander was the founding member of the Family. While the socio-political circumstances of Anaximander’s time mean that his work was prevented from reaching the wide audience that it deserved, there is evidence that his theories influenced later thinkers, who appear to share his enlightenment, and his allegiance. They too extolled the sovereignty of _Apeiron_ , and disdained human attempts to impose logic or order on the world. One cannot help but feel an inkling of kinship as one reads Herodotus despairing of the insensibility of mapmakers, who (dear fools!) rely overly on their faith in symmetry and order and position themselves at the centre of the world, and universe:

“I am amazed when I see that not one of all the people who have drawn maps of the world has set it out sensibly. They show Ocean as a river flowing around the outside if the earth, which is as circular as if it had been drawn with a pair of compasses, and they make Asia and Europe the same size.”

(Herodotus, _Histories._ )

I count Xenophanes, too, mong this select group of initiates of _Apeiron_. While he does not dwell, as Anaximander does, on ontology (or anti-ontology), he too derides the grasping need of humanity for significance, for positive knowable values. Tragically, he is another who leaves little written evidence (and while I do not wish to venture overmuch here, I cannot but feel some shred of suspicion over the absence of records regarding these early Initiates). I instead must turn to Clement’s _Miscellanies_ for an account of his views:

“If cows and horses or lions had hands,

Or could draw with their hands and make things as men can,

Horses would have drawn horse-like gods, cows cow-like gods,

And each species would have made the gods’ bodies just like their own.”

(Clement, _Miscellanies._ )

This passage sticks in my mind not only for its disavowal of a human-centric perspective of the universe and its divinities, but also the parallels Xenophanes draws between man and animal. While it is commonly conjectured that the Flesh only really gained its current foothold in the latter half of the second millennium, Xenophanes’ focus on linking beasts of burden to divine entities is… striking, to say the least. For if animals might be conjectured to have gods of their own, it is but a step to say that they also have Fears. One wonders…

Anaximander on the Entities and Rituals: Some Speculations

While lack of source material has thus far limited investigations in this area, I fully intend to explore other avenues regarding Anaximander’s theorisation of the Entities. He also demonstrated a queer fascination with principles of symmetry and balance; perhaps I am tainted by my recent research into the personal archives of Sir Robert Smirke, but I cannot lay to rest the suspicion that Anaximander’s theories on this score may hold a deeper significance.

While Anaximander’s _Apeiron_ may seem to resemble a world governed by the Vast (that towards which my Family strives) his vision is problematised by the presence of other elements. Namely, in his conception of a world originating from and ending in _Apeiron_ , he still posits _the existence of other elements_. As Theo writes, Anaximander observed the fundamental existence of “elements undergoing qualitative change”. (Theophrastus, _Commentary._ )

I return to Aristotle, who writes:

“There are some (including, among the thinkers of long ago, Anaximander) who say that _the earth stays where it is because of equality_. For something which is established in the centre and has equality in relation to the extremes has no more reason to move up than it does down or to the sides; _it is impossible for it to move in opposite directions at the same time, and so it is bound to stay where it is_.”

(Aristotle, _On the Heavens;_ italics my own _._ )

The scientific-minded Aristotle was referring to his reductive elements, his child’s jigsaw of water, earth, air and fire, and likely was under the impression that his predecessors were also. Nonetheless, to see Anaximander as an avatar of the Vast is to understand that he may not have been referring to anything so reductive or _knowable_ as the simple Aristotle might rather believe.

If we take the poles of extremes to be not the ‘natural elements’, but those forces we have come to know as the Entities… what then? By this rationale, Anaximander determined that the Earth “has equality in relation to the extremes [the Entities]”; that “it is impossible for it to move in opposite directions at the same time, and so it is bound to stay where it is.” (Aristotle, _On the Heavens._ )

Theophrastus, as well as noting Anaximander’s faith in the constancy of the elements of existence—the Entities, we might surmise—writes that the Founder concluded that “creation take[s] place not as a result of any of the elements [Entities] undergoing qualitative change, but as a result of the opposites being separated off by means of motion, which is eternal” (Theophrastus, _Commentary._ )

It seems reasonable to assume that Anaximander referred to the creation of a new order, governed by _Apeiron_ (or—though I shudder to think it—one of the other Entities) that would emerge after a successful ritual. But his thesis problematises the very theory behind the rituals as we have performed them (or attempted to perform them) for centuries.

I could blame this on my recent reading of Smirke, and yet I am stuck—stuck on the image of fourteen perfectly balanced Entities, opposites suspended in equilibrium. Might balance be a prerequisite? Might it be impossible for our reality to break its ties with all of the Entities in order to ascend to the realm of _Apeiron_?

If that is indeed the case (as our repeated failures would suggest)… What of the rituals? Are they bound never to succeed?

Or—perhaps there is a way that they could be made to work… by maintaining the existence of all fourteen Entities, and the tensions between them, a world of “opposites being separated off by means of motion, which is eternal”…

This angle of his thought has led my predecessors within the Family to label Anaximander as an untrue disciple, who faltered in his faith. Nonetheless, I cannot dispel my curiosity.

Further research shall hopefully reveal whether he was enlightened or just misguided.

Statement end.

Archivist notes:

Well, that is an interesting statement—though not a usual statement per se. I took the trouble of writing it up and referencing it myself, for the benefit of my successor; I don’t trust any of my assistants with material this delicate. I shan’t be recording it, for obvious reasons—I should prefer to keep it out of Elias’ line of sight, as it were.

I will admit, I had been wondering what had become of Ananda. We had not spoken in some years; the last time I met with them we had something of a falling out regarding the events related in Statement #5372506. I believe at this time they had already had their… disagreement with Simon, for soon after that they disappeared, and I was unable to trace them. It was with no small amount of surprise that I last week received a letter indicating that I had been left as a beneficiary in their will. Among what was left for me were old plans for a small submersible vehicle (in, if my eyes do not deceive me, the hand of Simon Fairchild), some books on Classical thought in Ancient Greek (with margin notes, also in Ancient Greek) and several files of copious notes handwritten by Ananda themself. The lawyer was unable to tell me the exact circumstances of Ananda’s death, save that they had been found in the German city of Hamburg, apparently having fallen from a great height.

I cannot be certain as to the reasons they chose to leave these writings to me, though I have my own ideas. While a Fairchild, they were not a fanatic, and we had cause to work together over the years. The question is why they decided to send their papers here, to the Institute. Perhaps Simon was growing more assiduous in his quest to rid the world of his erstwhile protegee. The incompleteness of the notes which I have received suggests that he was successful in eliminating them before they could fully complete the research they describe. Perhaps they conjectured that the information they gathered would be safer with me, or that I could put it to use? Or perhaps it was an impulsive decision, made to spite the Fairchilds who had hunted them—to gift their last gift to a rival Power.

Whatever the reason might have been, it is not my concern. What I am rather _more_ concerned about is the information contained within these files, particularly in this statement. While their theories regarding the origins of the Falling Titan are intriguing, I am far more interested in their hypotheses regarding the rituals. I confess, I have harboured suspicions of my own for quite some time; now that more evidence is in my hands, and within the Institute, I feel I must make a move. There is still the question of whether this is information that _he_ already possesses. I am not sure I shall like the answer.

Either way, I shall have to alter my plans accordingly. There is another ritual coming up in Ny-Alesund. I had hoped to have more time, but if there is any danger that Elias might know what I do—I fear I may have to take this opportunity to make my move. For better or worse.

Bibliography

Aristotle, _On the Heavens_. In Waterfield, R. (trans.) (2000) The First Philosophers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, p. 16.

Aristotle, _Physics._ In Waterfield, R. (trans.) (2000) The First Philosophers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 15–16.

Clement, _Miscellanies_. In Waterfield, R. (trans.) (2000) The First Philosophers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, p. 27.

Herodotus, _Histories_ 4.36.2. In Waterfield, R. (trans.) (2000) The First Philosophers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, p. 14.

Theophrastus, _Commentary on Aristotle’s ‘Physics’_. In Waterfield, R. (trans.) (2000) The First Philosophers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, p. 14.

**Author's Note:**

> Still not quite sure how I ended up writing an academic article expounding upon the possible Presocratic origins of the Vast and the Fairchilds. I've always been quite curious about this particular Entity and its avatars, and when I was reading about Anaximander I thought that his theories really fit in with TMA lore, so...
> 
> All the philosophy is real and all of the quotes are accurate, though to my knowledge, Anaximander did not suffocate to death in a locked room, nor did he found a family of agoraphilic cultists.


End file.
